Inside the Braves with MLB.com's Mark Bowman

Prado placed on the 15-day DL

Instead of playing a man short over the course of the next week, the Braves have determined to place Martin Prado on the 15-day disabled list. The All-Star second baseman fractured his right pinky finger while completing a head-first slide toward the plate in Friday’s win over the Reds.

After examining Prado again Monday, the Braves determined that it would likely be at least another week before he was strong enough to grip a bat with his right hand again. Thus they decided to disable him and promote Diory Hernandez from Triple-A Gwinnett to serve as a backup infielder.

“If he was only going to be out a couple of days, we could wait,” Braves manager Bobby Cox said. “But I don’t think it would be good if he’s going to be out for like 10 days.”

Prado said his finger was feeling a little better Monday. He took some swings off the batting tee using only his left arm and shagged fly balls during batting practice. The Braves remain hopeful that he will be ready to return to action when he’s eligible to be activated on Aug. 15.

While Prado is sidelined, Omar Infante will serve as the leadoff hitter and starting second baseman.

No surprise there given how long it took Heyward to get right from his injury, they must know it will be a lingering problem until he gives it proper rest. Luckily we have Infante and are beginning a homestand so damage won’t be as bad as it could be.

Like today’s lineup. About time Cox moved Glaus down. Now if he would just flip Chipper and Heyward, it would be perfect!

I think the reason that they decided to put him on the DL was simply because he was going to take 10-15 days to heal, and why play a player down when you can bring someone up. There is no need to rush this injury. I’m surprised we don’t see Canizares up, I would think we would need a bat off of the bench instead of a backup infielder since we already have Conrad and Hinske.

Bill, I agree Chipper is a liability, however, I think he would be less of a liability in another hitting position in the order, he’s a rally killer right now.
I think our biggest liability has nothing to do with performance. The fact that Kawakami is warming the pine and collecting a big check has disabled up from acquiring more power. I’m not a complete Anti-Wren, but I have never understood this move, and now its still haunting us. Well….at least he’s not Mike Hampton.

I think the post originally said the 16th when I commented, which I figured was an oversight. I was just asking to see if it was being applied retroactively as I thought was appropriate. I can see the math to get to the 15th, I just couldn’t see how it was the 16th.

I think that if they made Prado’s DL retroactive, it would go only back to the 31st since it would be odd to put someone on the DL the day of their injury. Therefore, the 15th day of the stint would be 8/14 and he’d be eligible to come off the next day.

I like having Ankiel out there, even if the doesn’t contribute that much with the stick, his arm and athleticism will be much better the McLouth and Melky. Of couse, he already has an RBI single, hopefully he keeps it up. Something about playing the Mets always seems to get out wheels rolling.

They are not going to DL Glaus simply because he’s not hurt. He said himself he isn’t underperforming due to injury. If we DL’ed everyone with aches and pains we wouldn’t have a team. Plus we can’t put Chipper over at 1B, imagine him involved in just about every defensive play. He wouldn’t last a week, he would tweak his body somehow. I think at the most, we should spell Infante for Chipper at 3B as much as possible and give Hinske some innings at 1B. At whatever cost, we need to have Infante in as much as possible. Even if he has to play a different position each day.

???? tweak his body somehow???? I have imagined Chipper playing defense at 1B. Most corner infielders adjust nicely back and forth. He has as much chance of “tweaking” something at 3b as he does at 1b. Not saying it wouldn’t happen, mind you, just stating the odds are the same.

How many times does a 3B touch the ball, and how many times does the 1B touch the ball… Obviously the 1B sees more action, meaning a greater chance of getting hurt. Chipper is so fragile we don’t need to chance our luck.

Unfortunately with Glaus lately it seems that clock is only right twice a week.

Speedy I have to agree, I like Ankiel’s athleticism and arm in the out field far and away better than, Chubby and No throw. It will remain to be seen how much gas he has left in his hitting tank, but maybe he just needed a contender to get him going. I have always loved his story, just wasn’t sure he was the trade we really needed.

The ESPN guys were talking about Troy’s back tonite, but I think that just because they are clueless.

While it is nice to see Chipper homer today, I fear that Cox will view it as vindication for batting him third instead of looking at the three previous groundouts before it that have defined Chipper’s season and move him out of the spot.

He can draw walks, so hit him second and let Heyward hit third please! That or put Diaz there and move Heyward to 5th.

But how true is it that they braves and mariners are gonna be swapping bad contracts in Figgins and Kawakami. I have a feeling that this would be a sweet sweet deal and now we dont have to worry bout his contract.

I really doubt Farnsworth will get the mop up role. I think he’ll be a 7th inning and maybe 8th inning guy when Venters and Saito needs rest. The bullpen we have now is pretty scary. Go check out the numbers put up by Wags, Saito, Venters, Moylan, O’Flaherty, now we have Farnsworth whose numbers this year have been great. And our mopman is a pretty decent pitcher himself. When the rosters expand we have Kimbrel, Dunn, Marek, etc. Not too bad.

Chipper is not a liability. Anybody who thinks a guy with a 370 OBP is a liability is crazy – sorry bill. I would like to see him hit second to get heyward some more RBI opportunities. He is not the player he was, but he is still a contributor. Please compare his OBP to Prado and you will see he gets on base almost as much.

Chipper’s swing looks like he’s down scrubbing the floor right now. He IS a liability in the 3 hole. He’s in there to drive in runs.He will drive in 64 runs for the entire season at current pace. Prado has driven in the same amount of runs, OUT OF THE CLEANUP SPOT!!!!! Call me crazy all you want, He is not producing runs. He isn’t getting paid to take walks, which is why his OBP is respectable. Once he gets a walk, he can’t go from 1st to third, can’t score from 1st on a double and likely won’t score from 2nd on a single(only scored 41 runs). He takes up a roater spot on those days when he choses to dodge a tough pitcher. Sorry Ziff, But he IS a liability. I loved Chipper during his heyday as much as anyone, would love to see him in the HOF, but he is done. Time for that old cowboy to hang up his spurs.

Chipper is hitting .250 and on pace for a dozen homers and maybe 65 RBI. If he is the number 3 hitter in the lineup every day, he is a liability with that type of production, but only because it is the 3 hole. There are very few 3 hole hitters that produce less than Chipper at this point. His OBP has been steadily dropping as his walks continue to drop (10 in each of the last two months, 37 in the first two months before the league got the word he has trouble with the fastball). Since June 1 his OBP is only in the .338 range. If he hits in the 2 or 6 hole, he is another slightly above average guy in the lineup. That being said, he is still the leader on the field and in the dugout, but he is not the centerpiece of the batting order, and if he is positioned to be so, he is going to fail based on the last 14 months he has played.
Again, Chipper has had a great career, but there won’t be any highlights on his HOF reel from 2010, that is just the way it is for Chipper, and most every other aging star. Nobody has to tell Chipper this. I have truly enjoyed watching Chipper over the years, but he is what he is, and he was what he was, and we would be doing the Braves a disservice getting those two players mixed up at this point.

U know if the Mariners dont wanna trade Figgins for KK why not use KK as in long relief for the rest of the year and have him and Venters compete for the closer role next year during spring training or maybe see anyone else that can take on KK like Royals Astros Angels or maybe the Mets or Yankees. Or make the deal for Figgins and add couple more players like Doiry and Hicks in the deal with KK for Figgins.

I have one caveat against batting Chipper #2, and that’s that he’s tied with Mac for 2nd on the team in GIDP with 10. Chipper batting 6th may not be a bad idea though… and we can move either Ankiel or Gonzalez to 2nd (career-wise, they’ve done well there), and finally bat Heyward 3rd.
According to the Braves homepage, apparently O’Flaherty’s viral infection has been mono. Ouch.

I’m just hoping 2010 for Chipper turns out like 1979 for Willie Stargell. The exception of course is that Stargell was a major contributor to that WS title. I would love to see the next two months go that way for Chipper as well.
The Braves would be taking a huge risk depending on Chipper that way at this point. He is getting by on pure knowledge at this point, guessing an awful lot. If Chipper goes .280/.380/.420 the rest of the way from the 2 or 6 hole, he’ll be a hero and major contributing factor. If he puts up the same numbers from the 3 hole he will be labeled as a disappointment. Perception is reality. If he continues on with the .250/.335/.380 of the last two months, and he stays in the 3 hole, he will be an obstacle, and maybe THE obstacle, that keeps the Braves from the WS in 2010. That is not how he wants to go out, or be remembered in Atlanta.

Barry, do you really want Chipper moving and running just about every defensive play. Think about that for a while. He is already extremely limited, just leave him at third. All he needs to do is take one step to the left or right and the occassional slow roller, maybe 5-6 plays a game. The guy has had oblique and toe (bunyon) issues for last few years. The less movement he needs to take right now, the better. He said that he would retire when he became an average player. It pains me to say it, but he is very average now. We would probably get the same production out of Conrad at 3B at this point. However, having a veteran switch hitter on your team (and the last remaining member of our WS team) is valuable for this season. I would expect with all certainty that he will retire after this season. He has had a fantastic career and I think this is his swan song, let’s win this one for him, Bobby, and all the other guys that have fought thier butts off this year.

Haha yeah, he wasn’t doing so good. Figured we could’ve packaged him as the flagship player in a deal for Fielder.
Anyways, this organization has assembled quite the group of center fielders over the year.. Blanco would pretend he was good at times which masked his AAAA skill set, Melky is playing below his value, Schafer can’t hit anything above AA anymore, Taveras and J Anderson can’t hit above .200 in the minors, McLouth is sent down and goes on a tear but probably won’t translate that in Atlanta, and who knows what to expect from Ankiel. Also, what the h*ll do we do if McLouth keeps tearing it up in Gwinnett and Ankiel just performs ok?

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